Not much to say about the match. I had good tickets and locos in the first 4 matches. Pifbat tried some good and clever blocks, but as I had enough locos I could always come through or finish quickly. After that the match was over and we exchanged 2 games that could have gone either way.

I was the luckiest tonight, not especially in colors, but in locos (an average of 6 per game in the five first ones)... and when you can put 3 locos to have the 6's you need, or when you can be aggressive due to them, it's immediately easier.
Plus, a good winning drawing in the penultimate turn of a game that's been very good played by my opponent.
Plus, perfect colors in the last game to finish very quickly, despite only 4 locos.
All in all, I can't complain... but really, everybody knows that I never complain... no ?

So, our clash is already over : victory 4-0 for Red TGV !

Good luck in your last clash. It was a pleasure for us to meet you in such good terms... Grazie mille e ciao amichi

Interesting games. Killer block on NY with Sea-NY and LA-NY in my hands was not really nice in game 2, but finishing the blocking in game 4 and playing 5 blue before 6 red in game 5 by Pascal might have easily turned the result around. So no complaining from my side.
Good luck for the rest of NC, Pascal, and thanks for the nice games and atmosphere.

0:1 (86:107)Tor-Mia + Hel-LA (n.f.)+ Start vs SSM-Nas + Win-LR (Dul-ElP discarded)
I was able to play a comfortable northern route (Van-Mon) after Pascal laid 6 black early. He probably decided to skip Hel-LA and tried to play east starting with 6 purple. Pascal had to draw at the end but didn't find a helping tic (Win-Hou). Perfect start with a break for me.

1:1 (100:67)Van-Mon + Chi-No vs Sal-SLC + Win-LR (n.f.) + Start (Mon-Atl discarded)
Pascal started with 6 yellow and 6 orange, i played 6 orange on grey and 6 white, after his 1 (Van) i laid 5 black. He had to try to connect Mon via 3 blue to NY and i thought my chance would be to isolate his eastern tracks ... so we went step by step from north to south in the east. The problem for me was that there were 2 yellows lying open which i could not take ... he could after i blocked Nash-StLo and play them with 2 Locos.
2 singles at the end on my hand gave him also longest - so i had to draw but didn't find anything useful (Hel-LA).

2:1 (111:88)Dal-NY + Win-LR + Start vs SSM-Okl + Kan-Hou (SF-Atl discarded)
Again lots of northern sixers in the beginning (Pascal yellow and white, me orange, purple and blue on grey) my opponent played two green to NY ... and i thought he has Sea-NY and again tried to avoid this connection. Didn't work as he had Dal-NY and enough green.

3:1 (112:109)Por-Pho + Dul-ElP vs Sea-NY + Dul-Hou (n.f.) + Start (Mon-NO discarded) Early decided to skip Dul-Hou and tried to win it finishing early with trackpoints + 14 ... throwing 6 green out of my way into Texas ... but that didn't disturb him and of course gave him longest. At the end it was a close thing - he had to have this combo to win ... Den-ElP or Hel-LA o his side would help me ... but he had 11+10. He on the other hand had to hope that i didn't have 20+22 ... that worked.

4:1 (143:122)Sea-NY + Van-Mon + Start vs LA-NY + Dul-ElP (SSM-Nas discarded)
Not much to say about this game. This time an easy win for Pascal with 42 and starting advantage. Nevertheless losing this game with 122 points (and in this case also the match and the clash) was a bitter pill ... but the hope that he could have another second tic minus like me in the game before was in vain.

5:1 (116:106)LA-Chi + Por-Pho vs Van-SFe + Win-LR + Start (SF-Atl discarded)
Don't remember exactly ... one thing was that I had only 3 white and 3 locos which made it difficult to get longest.

Overall i had not many locos (3 or 4 always) and therefore wasn't very flexible many times and had to draw lots of things open - but nothing to complain.
Grats Pascal - well done and well deserved.
Thanks for interesting games and good luck in the playoffs.

Thank you again Armin for the match and now for this excellent summary.

The 3 first games were very difficult for me. On the second one, we blocked each other and it was a chance for me to find a way up to Montréal without 5 black and 6 pink. I thought it was a 20 against a 17+22 as you took the 1 in portland and the ny-pitt link. Really headache for me to block this 2 destination doing my way in the same time. You finally joined NY but losing the route. I was lucky you had no one of the 2 actually.

I had clearly the best tickets, colors and chance to win with the 3 last games. So the match was tighter than the result 5-1 seems to show. And always interesting and fair.
So I hope that we will meet again later in the competition... perhaps in finale. Not so long way up there, only to beat Ueg, Tus, Wasa, Red, Sos, Cat, Austrians... so easy